Thursday 25 February 2010

Normal, large, larger and larger

Just another test. How many times is it possible to increase the font-size before there appears a horizontal scrolbar. This time the test is in Firefox on a 1024x768 pixel monitor.
  1. bol.com 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  2. funda.nl 4x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  3. helenahoeve.nl After 8x 'CTRL +' (the maximum fontsize), there is still no horizontal scrollbar
  4. nu.nl 5x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  5. philips.nl 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  6. postbus51.nl 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  7. rabobank.nl 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  8. vrom.nl 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  9. wehkamp.nl 1x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
  10. wnf.nl 2x 'CTRL +' gives a horizontal scrollbar
This gives the following ranking for allowed font-size:
Only helenahoeve.nl did not get an horizontal scrollbar! That's great.

Monday 15 February 2010

Getting it all together

The website helenahoeve.nl is a great site which could be improved in the following ways:

Safety
  1. Ask for ratings on www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/www.helenahoeve.nl;
  2. Make the forms secure;
Accesability
  1. Create a logical tab order through links, form controls, and objects by using the tabindex attribute;
  2. Provide keyboard shortcuts to important links (including those in client-side image maps), form controls, and groups of form controls by using the accesskey attribute;
Update: According to the Dutch page http://www.webrichtlijnen.nl/handleiding/ontwikkeling/productie/links-navigatie/sneltoets-koppelingen/ the use of the accesskey attribute is not recommended.

Usability of the forms
  1. Detect an error on a form as soon as possible;
  2. Let the user correct the error on the form directly;
Popularity




  1. Try to improve the visibility in search engines as Bing and Yahoo.
Thank you for following these tests. 




Lipperhey scores

There is a great tool which probably make all other tests unnecessary. It is called Lipperhey. The results are:
  1. bol.com Technical 7.2, SEO Score 73%, Populatity 10.0, Overall score 8.2
  2. funda.nl Technical 6.4, SEO Score 75%, Populatity 10.0, Overall score 8.0
  3. helenahoeve.nl Technical 8.6, SEO Score 76%, Populatity 7.0, Overall score 7.7
  4. nu.nl Technical 5.7, SEO Score 48%, Populatity 10.0, Overall score 6.8
  5. philips.nl Technical 6.0, SEO Score 59%, Populatity 9.0, Overall score 7.0
  6. postbus51.nl Technical 8.0, SEO Score 74%, Populatity 9.0, Overall score 8.1
  7. rabobank.nl Technical 7.3, SEO Score 76%, Populatity 10.0, Overall score 8.3
  8. vrom.nl Technical 7.2, SEO Score 55%, Populatity 10.0, Overall score 7.6
  9. wehkamp.nl Technical 4.0, SEO Score 0%, Populatity 3.0, Overall score 2.3
  10. wnf.nl Technical 7.5, SEO Score 67%, Populatity 9.0, Overall score 7.7
The most important thing to do seems to be getting more popular ;-)

Time to work on the backlinks. But first the results as a graph:









SERP Search results

SERP is standing for Search Engine Results Page, searching for the websites gives these results on Google:
  1. bol Number 1
  2. funda Number 1
  3. helenahoeve Number 1
  4. nu Number 1
  5. philips Number 1
  6. postbus51 Number 1
  7. rabobank Number 1
  8. vrom Number 1
  9. wehkamp Number 1
  10. wnf Number 1
The same for Bing:
  1. bol Number 1
  2. funda Number 1
  3. helenahoeve Number 3 and 4, number 1 is helenahoeve.hyves.nl
  4. nu Number 1
  5. philips Number 1
  6. postbus51 Number 1
  7. rabobank Number 1
  8. vrom Number 1
  9. wehkamp Number 1
  10. wnf Number 1
Last but not least. Yahoo!
  1. bol Number 1
  2. funda Number 1
  3. helenahoeve Not on the first page
  4. nu Not on the first page
  5. philips Not on the first page, however philips.com (which redirects to philips.nl) is at number 1
  6. postbus51 Number 1
  7. rabobank Number 5, however rabobank.com is at number 1
  8. vrom Number 1
  9. wehkamp Number 1
  10. wnf Number 1
Hmmm, I think I need to contact Bing and Yahoo about these results.

Pageranks

How visible are the test websites. Time to look at the pageranks.
  1. bol.com Pagerank: 6
  2. funda.nl Pagerank: 7
  3. helenahoeve.nl Pagerank: 3
  4. nu.nl Pagerank: 7
  5. philips.nl Pagerank: 7
  6. postbus51.nl Pagerank: 8
  7. rabobank.nl Pagerank: 7
  8. vrom.nl Pagerank: 8
  9. wehkamp.nl Pagerank: 6
  10. wnf.nl Pagerank: 6
See also this graph:

How to improve the forms

In one of the earlier tests I concluded that 6 of the 10 test websites do have a contact form. Let's see how good these forms are. I think the following questions are relevant:
  1. Is it a secure form;
  2. How much information is necessary;
  3. What is the response to an error.
Let's see how secure the forms are:
  1. helenahoeve.nl Not secure
  2. philips.nl Not secure
  3. postbus51.nl Secure
  4. vrom.nl Not secure, note: vrom.nl redirects the user to the postbus51.nl forms
  5. wehkamp.nl Secure
  6. wnf.nl Secure
Not bad, 3 out of 6 forms are secure. The ranking is:
  1. postbus51.nl, wehkamp.nl, wnf.nl
  2. helenahoeve.nl, philips.nl, vrom.nl
Okay, how much information is necessary:
  1. helenahoeve.nl 4, fields, 4 of them are required
  2. philips.nl 18 fields, 5 of them are required
  3. postbus51.nl 11 fields, 8 of them are required
  4. vrom.nl 4 fields, 3 of them are required
  5. wehkamp.nl 11 logical fields, none of them indicated as required (however 3 fields seems to be required)
  6. wnf.nl 16 logical fields, 8 of them are required
Ranking these websites based on the number of fields, give this overview:
So far, so good, what is the response on an error (e.g. e-mail address is a@b,c with a comma instead of a dot).
  1. helenahoeve.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid. You have to go back to the form to correct it.
  2. philips.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid. You are able to correct it directly.
  3. postbus51.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid. You are able to correct it directly.
  4. vrom.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid at the moment you make the mistake. You are able to correct it directly.
  5. wehkamp.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid. You are able to correct it directly.
  6. wnf.nl Error message that the e-mail address is not valid. You have to click on the OK button before you are able to correct it.
Ranking the forms gives this list:
  1. vrom.nl
  2. philips.nl, postbus51.nl, wehkamp.nl
  3. helenahoeve.nl, wnf.nl
Great, there are a few things I could improve:
  1. Make the forms secure;
  2. Detect the error as soon as possible;
  3. Let the user correct the error directly.

Hot, not or useless

CommandShift3 is a website where people compare two sites a time. Lets see how hot the test websites are...
  1. bol.com Preparing for battle
  2. funda.nl Preparing for battle
  3. helenahoeve.nl 14% won 3 of 21 battles
  4. nu.nl 20% won 15 of 75 battles
  5. philips.nl Preparing for battle
  6. postbus51.nl Preparing for battle
  7. rabobank.nl Preparing for battle
  8. vrom.nl Preparing for battle
  9. wehkamp.nl 20% won 18 of 88 battles
  10. wnf.nl Preparing for battle
Hmmm there are not much battles, however the ranking is:
  1. nu.nl, wehkamp.nl
  2. helenahoeve.nl
It is a pity, I did not learn much from this test. Luckily there are more websites to review websites. Lets take a look at sitecritic.net...
  1. bol.com Search results: None found
  2. funda.nl Search results: None found
  3. helenahoeve.nl Search results: None found
  4. nu.nl Search results: None found
  5. philips.nl Search results: None found
  6. postbus51.nl Search results: None found
  7. rabobank.nl Search results: None found
  8. vrom.nl Search results: None found
  9. wehkamp.nl Search results: None found
  10. wnf.nl Search results: None found
Funny, but useless results.

May be we should try Website Judge...
  1. bol.com 3 reviews, total score: 9
  2. funda.nl 0 reviews
  3. helenahoeve.nl 0 reviews
  4. nu.nl 4 reviews, total score: 8
  5. philips.nl 0 reviews
  6. postbus51.nl 0 reviews
  7. rabobank.nl 1 review, total score: 6
  8. vrom.nl 0 reviews
  9. wehkamp.nl 0 reviews
  10. wnf.nl 0 reviews
If you want to take this serious, the ranking is:
  1. bol.com
  2. nu.nl
  3. rabobank.nl
As far as I know now, these judge websites are useless.


The need for speed

The speed of a website is very important. According to Akamai nowadays a website should have a respons of  max 2 seconds. According to Jacob Nielsen a good site have a respons of max 1 second.

Yahoo has a great tool for Firebug users. It is called YSlow and gives an indication of the speed of your website. Testing the websites with YSlow give the following results:
  1. bol.com Grade E, Overall performance score 58
  2. funda.nl Grade B, Overall performance score 80
  3. helenahoeve.nl Grade A, Overall performance score 92
  4. mobiel.nu.nl Grade C, Overall performance score 78
  5. philips.nl Grade C, Overall performance score 70
  6. postbus51.nl Grade D, Overall performance score 69
  7. rabobank.nl Grade C, Overall performance score 70
  8. vrom.nl Grade D, Overall performance score 67
  9. m.wehkamp.nl Grade C, Overall performance score 77
  10. wnf.nl Grade E, Overall performance score 56
This gives the following ranking:
Testing the websites with tools.pingdom.com gives these results:
  1. bol.com 160 objects, 9.1 seconds
  2. funda.nl 13 objects, 1.2 seconds
  3. helenahoeve.nl 19 objects, 0.7 seconds
  4. mobiel.nu.nl 20 objects, 1.1 seconds
  5. philips.nl 4 objects, 1.7 seconds
  6. postbus51.nl 100 objects, 2.7 seconds
  7. rabobank.nl 78 objects, 3.1 seconds
  8. vrom.nl 38 objects, 1.6 seconds
  9. m.wehkamp.nl 46 objects, 1.7 seconds
  10. wnf.nl 285 objects, 6.3 seconds
The ranking order is the following:
helenahoeve.nl is the only site which speed is below one second!

The ranking is:

  1. helenahoeve.nl
  2. funda.nl, mobiel.nu.nl, philips.nl, vrom.nl, m.wehkamp.nl
  3. bol.com, postbus51.nl, rabobank.nl, wnf.nl

Sunday 14 February 2010

Things to do to improve the quality of the code

The tests I have done so far learned me that the quality of the HTML code is very good compared with the other test sites. helenahoeve.nl is the only site without HTML errorsthe only site who passes the automated WAI verification test and the only site who renders well in all test situations (see some older blogs on the webblog).

At this moment it is clear for me that I don't have to put energy in creating better HTML code.

There is printing and printing

The last test in the quality test serie is the printer test. Initial I want to test this on a MacBook only. This is because I thought that Apple understood the use of PDF. With a MacBook you can after the print commando directly save the result a a PDF instead of a physical print. The results were a little bit strange. I seems that Flash components of the webpage will not be printed.

So I decided to create also PDF's with PDFCreator on a XP machine. For the third time during these tests I am flabbergasted. The results are not always the same. Huh, what is happening here?

I do not understand this, however I can judge the results:
  1. bol.com Inconsistent
  2. funda.nl Inconsistent
  3. helenahoeve.nl Consistent, specific print layout available
  4. nu.nl Consistent
  5. philips.nl Inconsistent
  6. postbus51.nl Consistent
  7. rabobank.nl Inconsistent
  8. vrom.nl Inconsistent
  9. wehkamp.nl Inconsistent
  10. wnf.nl Inconsistent
The helenahoeve is the only website with a specific print lay-out!

See the screenshots (left Apple's Save as PDF, right Windows XP PDFCreator):

Friday 12 February 2010

Watching television

One of the last tests is viewing the sites on the television by taking a look at the test websites with the Opera Browser for the Wii.

The test results are:
  1. bol.com Horizontal scroll needed
  2. funda.nl Great
  3. helenahoeve.nl Great, seperate design for the television
  4. nu.nl Great
  5. philips.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  6. postbus51.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  7. rabobank.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  8. vrom.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  9. wehkamp.nl Bad design, almost empty page
  10. wnf.nl Bad design, almost empty page

Ranking the sites gives the following list:
  1. funda.nl, helenahoeve.nl, nu.nl
  2. bol.com, philips.nl, postbus51.nl, rabobank.nl, vrom.nl
  3. wehkamp.nl, wnf.nl
See also these screenshots:

Thursday 11 February 2010

The HTC TyTN 2 test

Time to test the sites with a real mobile phone. The display of the HTC TyTN 2 is a 2.8 inch, 240 X 320 QVGA TFT-LCD display with adjustable angle and backlight. Testing the sites with this phone gives the following results:

The test results are:
  1. bol.com Horizontal scroll needed
  2. funda.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices
  3. helenahoeve.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices
  4. nu.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (mobiel.nu.nl)
  5. philips.nl Very bad, no idea what this site is about
  6. postbus51.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices
  7. rabobank.nl Bad design, horizontal scroll needed
  8. vrom.nl Very bad, no idea what this site is about, horizontal scroll needed
  9. wehkamp.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (m.wehkamp.nl)
  10. wnf.nl Bad design, however no horizontal scroll needed


Ranking the sites gives the following list:
  1. funda.nl, helenahoeve.nl, nu.nl, postbus51.nl, wehkamp.nl
  2. bol.com
  3. philips.nl, rabobank.nl, vrom.nl, wnf.nl
See also these screenshots:

The iPhone test


The iPhone is a strange phone. When I test the resolution of the iPhone with www.helenahoeve.nl/peek.htm I always get an horizontal width of 320 pixels. For this test I set the viewport to 320x480. Disable flash and set the user agent to iPhone 3.0.

The test results are:
  1. bol.com Horizontal scroll needed
  2. funda.nl Bad layout, horizontal scroll needed
  3. helenahoeve.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices
  4. nu.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (mobiel.nu.nl)
  5. philips.nl Very bad, no idea what this site is about, horizontal scroll needed
  6. postbus51.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  7. rabobank.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  8. vrom.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  9. wehkamp.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (m.wehkamp.nl)
  10. wnf.nl Very bad, no idea what this site is about, horizontal scroll needed

Ranking the sites gives the following list:
  1. helenahoeve.nl, nu.nl, wehkamp.nl
  2. bol.com, postbus51.nl, rabobank.nl, vrom.nl
  3. funda.nl, philips.nl, wnf.nl
Note that nu.nl has a special iPhone version of the mobile site.

See also these screenshots:

Tuesday 9 February 2010

The superphone test

Google stated that the Nexus One is a superphone. The resolution is 480x800 pixels. I do not have a Nexus  One (allthough I think I will love it). To test the websites for the Nexus One I used Firefox with the Web Developer toolbar. With this toolbar I resized the viewport of the Firefox to 480x800.

With these settings, the results are:
  1. bol.com Horizontal scroll needed
  2. funda.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  3. helenahoeve.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices
  4. nu.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (mobiel.nu.nl)
  5. philips.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  6. postbus51.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  7. rabobank.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  8. vrom.nl Horizontal scroll needed
  9. wehkamp.nl Great, seperate design for mobile devices (m.wehkamp.nl)
  10. wnf.nl Horizontal scroll needed
Ranking the sites gives the following list:
  1. helenahoeve.nl, nu.nl, wehkamp.nl
  2. bol.com, funda.nl, philips.nl, postbus51.nl, rabobank.nl, vrom.nl, wnf.nl
See also these screenshots: